Amber Palace rennovation: Tampering with history?

In times to come, the Amber Palace, a must-visit historical monument in the Pink City, might just change the way you look at history.

| TNN | Jan 3, 2009, 03:46 IST

JAIPUR: In times to come, the Amber Palace, a must-visit historical monument in the Pink City, might just change the way you look at history. The effort to make the fort a living monument has led to large scale renovations, including changing the Jaleb Chowk flooring from Karauli stone to a more regimentally even Dholpur, devoid of the old feel and starkly marbled and tiled toilets in the 17th century fort.The nearly 1,000-year-old capital of the Kachchawa Rajputs undergoing restoration with a sanction of Rs 40 crore, has paved way for renovation too, which to a great extent is changing the complexion of the palace.

Perturbed by the changes, Minakshi Jain, the restoration architect and consultant for Amber, has sent in a 29-point guideline on do's and don'ts to the Amber Development and Management Authority (ADMA).

"This is the largest restoration work going on in the country with Rs 12 crore already spent with a vision to give the monument to the future generations. But the pace of work at Amber is very fast as probably the government wants to rush it. Nagaur Fort restoration took 13 years," said Minakshi, whose Nagaur restoration project won the Unesco-Asia Pacific Award of Excellence for Cultural Heritage Conservation, for its combination of modern scientific techniques with traditional building practices.

But apparently, Minakshi is not very happy with the way restoration at Amber is progressing. "They are not using me as a true consultant. A large part of decisions are taken by the ADMA, including the Juneja Art Gallery that does not gel at all with the fort architecture," she said. Hence, one of the guidelines given to ADMA reads, "Prime importance must be given to the character of historic built. Shop fronts to be similar in form, rhythm, ornamentation, and character of the surrounding facades. Degree of ornamentation not to be in confrontation with existing exteriors."

But Juneja Art Gallery, a profit- sharing venture with ADMA, was only the beginning. "When the Amber development authority took over the restoration work, a tiny florist, who for years had been supplying flowers for offering at the temple, had to shut shop as he was told that according to ASI, no commercial activity was allowed at the historical monument. But today the monument is thriving on commercial activity," said a tour operator.

And very soon the living fort would also house several fashion designers and also make for a venue for high profile weddings. However, in the entire process to make Amber a living palace as in the west, ADMA is losing focus on its prime target audience- the tourists.

"Whenever they have any film shooting in the fort they discontinue the elephant rides causing inconvenience to the tourists. Earlier, we used to take the tourists through the fort chronologically, but now there is no continuity in the circuit. The Hamam Singh Dwar with the sun dial, where the rulers used to begin their day with sun salutation now is not accessible at all," said a tour guide.

Then there is large scale knocking down of walls to discover the hidden passage to Jaigarh Fort that was apparently closed over the years. While Minakshi says that all that is being removed is accretion - there is little information on that account available to the tourist. "I wonder what Century Palace, we will get to see later," said Rita Sharma who was perplexed for lack of signage directing the tourist.

"I had heard lots about Amber. But when I saw how they were removing ancient stones and replacing them with new ones, I wondered how renovation was being done in the name of restoration. I feel they should just keep the old structures as they are and not add something new and spoil the beauty," says Saket Tiberwal, a tourist from University of Nottingham, UK.

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